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They are referred to with many different names: vacation home rentals, short terms rentals, or simply by the name of the company they are most associated with – AirBnB’s.
The boom that the Morongo Basin saw since has been experiencing since the early days of the Pandemic seems to be waning, but many of the issues that come with running commercial businesses in residential neighborhoods remain – and as spring and an anticipated superbloom approaches while an abnormally stormy winter season begins to loosen its grip – short term rentals continue to stay at the forefront of concerns for many citizens in the hi desert.
As some single family residences that were previously vacation rentals begin to return to the long term rental market – alternative structure short term rentals are still firmly in the county’s crosshairs.
Here’s 3rd district representative Dawn Rowe talking to Gary Daigneault on the “Up Close Show” about the status of alternative vacation rentals such as travel trailers, teepees and private campground services like Hipcamp:
Dawn Rowe:
“So how do how do we zone appropriately for that? That is a question that has been asked and if it’s really an interesting fine line because it is your private property… if you want to do things on your private property to earn a living that doesn’t impact your neighbors or the the environment should you have the right to do that?
The county is trying to answer that question… so yes you do pay property tax and yes you do have rights within, however if people when they come and they eat – do they have proper places to prepare that food? And then on the other end of that… do we have sanitation to accommodate that which happens afterwards?
We had Hipcamp come in, they are one of the bigger entities that promotes this stuff. All of those uses are currently illegal in our County. You can apply for a special conditional-use permit to go through the process – which we have had people do. It’s expensive and time-consuming so I would want to respect those people that have gone through that process to have the proper sanitation.
Right now “alts” or “alternative type camping” is illegal and we’ve met with Hipcamp and we’ve tried to communicate that with them. When we see listings pop up we ask them to take them down, but they’re they’re making money off of it and homeowners are making money off of it and so their solution to me was ‘what if we just put porta potties on all these sites?’
We met in a Joshua Tree office and they looked out and did a sweeping hand motion over Highway 62 and said ‘look at all this open space… you know nobody’s going to see a porta potty there’ and I said ‘can you see these houses? Those are their backyards… that’s not fair.”
Dawn Rowe and Gary Daigneault also talk about commercial camping ventures such as Autocamp in Joshua Tree, as well as the benefits of taxes collected from visitors through the Transit Occupancy Tax, which recently was used to provide hotel rooms to unhoused residents of 29 Palms.
So what is the current status of short term rentals in Yucca Valley, Joshua Tree and 29 Palms? Hilary Sloane did a report covering the requirements and limitations for current and new short term rentals in each area. As short term rentals remain a popular topic at weekly meetings like the Yucca Valley Town Council and Twentynine Palms Planning Commission – and we’ll always have full coverage of changes to the ever-evolving relationship between the desert, its residents, and those who want to come visit and experience the majesty of the Mojave desert.
You can hear the full conversation with Dawn Rowe on the Up-Close Show below – along with links to Hilary Sloane’s report on short-term rental rules and regulations below.
